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Benjamin E. Sasse (born 1972; pronounced "sass" ) is an American administrator, politician and member of the Republican Party who has served as the 15th President of Midland University in Fremont, Nebraska since December 10, 2010. In 2013, he announced his candidacy for the U.S. Senate being vacated by Mike Johanns.

Life and career
Sasse was born on February 22, 1972, in Plainview, Nebraska. He graduated from Fremont Senior High School in Fremont, Nebraska, in 1990.

Sasse was a student at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, from 1990 to 1994, graduating with a bachelor’s degree--concentration in Government. Sasse was a student at the University of Oxford in Oxford, England, during the fall of 1992 on a Harvard junior year abroad program.

Sasse was employed as an associate consultant in Chicago, Illinois, from September 1994 to November 1995 by Boston Consulting Group, a management consulting firm.

Sasse was employed as consultant/executive director in Anaheim, California by Christians United For Reformation ("CUFR") from November 1995 to November 1996. During Sasse's tenure, CUFR merged with the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals ("ACE"), and Sasse became executive director of ACE in Anaheim, California. Beginning in August 1996, Sasse commuted and worked remotely from Northern Virginia.

Sasse was a student at St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, from 1996 to 1998, graduating with a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies. Concurrently, Sasse was employed as a tutor/proctor for the page program by the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington, DC, from August 1996 to August 1998.

Sasse was a student and teaching fellow at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, from August of 1998 to May of 2004. Beginning in the fall of 2002, Sasse lived exclusively in Washington, DC, where he was writing and conducting research. Sasse was a full-time graduate student for the entire calendar years 2001, 2002 and 2003. Sasse graduated from Yale with a Master of Arts degree (M.A.), Master of Philosophy (M.Phil.) and Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D), all from the Department of History. Sasse’s dissertation, “The Anti-Madalyn Majority: Secular Left, Religious Right, and the Rise of Reagan's America (Madalyn Murray O'Hair)” won the Theron Rockwell Field (best dissertation) and the George Washington Egleston (history) Prizes. Concurrently, Sasse was employed as consultant/acting executive vice president by Westminster Seminary California of Escondido, California from August 2001 to Ocober 2002. Sasse did not live in California at this time, but commuted from Connecticut and then DC. Sasse has been a director of WSC since January of 2010.

Sasse was employed as chief of staff for the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Legal Policy in Washington, DC, from January 2004 to January 2005. Concurrently, Sasse was employed as a part-time assistant professor by the University of Texas at Austin in the fall of 2004, teaching one class by commuting from Washington to Austin.

Sasse was employed as chief of staff to Representative Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE) in Washington, DC, by the U.S. House of Representatives from January 2005 to July 2005.

Sasse, doing business as Platte Strategy Consulting, had a consulting contract with the US Department of Homeland Security ("DHS") in Washington, DC, from July 2005 to September 2005.

Sasse moved to Austin, Texas, to resume his professorship full-time in the Fall of 2005. Sasse was employed as an assistant professor at the University of Texas from September 2005 to December 2006.

Sasse was employed as counselor to the secretary by US Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) in Washington, DC, from December 2006 to December 2007. Following nomination by President George W. Bush in July 2007 and confirmation by the Senate in December 2007, Sasse was employed as assistant secretary for planning and evaluation from December 2007 to January 2009. During his tenure at HHS, Sasse was on unpaid leave from the University of Texas, which meant that his position was held open and unfilled pending his return.

During 2009, Sasse was advising private equity clients and health care investors and teaching at the University of Texas."

In October 2009, Sasse officially joined the University of Texas LBJ School of Public Affairs’ Center for Politics and Governance, in Austin, Texas, as a fellow, where he was to teach a number of courses and help develop new curriculum.

In November of 2009, the board of trustees of Midland Lutheran College announced that Sasse had been named president-elect and would take office in late spring of 2010. Sasse said that he and his family were looking forward to moving to Nebraska and that "My years at the LBJ School have made a deep impression on me. We expect often to be journeying back to Austin to participate in the engaged scholarship that is modeled so well here."

Sasse has been employed as president and professor of history by Midland Lutheran College, now Midland University ("Midland") from February 2010 to the present. Midland paid Sasse $288,483 in 2002 and $297,000 for the first eleven months of 2013. Sasse's employment contract with Midland was amended in October 2013 to reflect the reduction of presidential duties commensurate with the creation of a "chairman's cabinet" to oversee most daily institutional operations, reducing his salary to between $100,000 and $150,000. From January 2002 to November 2013, Sasse had additional earned income of $617,420 for strategy, speeches and fees from approximately twenty other entities, primarily healthcare related.

Midland University
Sasse was announced as the 15th president of Midland in October 2009. At the age of 38, he became one of the youngest chief executives in American higher education when he took over leadership of the 128-year-old institution in the spring of 2010. He was officially installed as President on December 10, 2010.

In 2011, Midland introduced a program guaranteeing that participating students would graduate in four years. The school's freshman enrollment increased by 32% from fall 2011 to fall 2012; Sasse attributed this growth to the new policy.

In 2012, the school's accrediting agency, the Higher Learning Commission, placed it "on notice", expressing "concerns related to the University's finances and planning and its processes for assessment and utilization of student learning outcomes". The HLC called for Midland to file final reports in 2014, demonstrating that these concerns had been resolved.

In 2013, Midland acquired the Blair, Nebraska campus of defunct Dana College.

2014 U.S. Senate election
In October 2013, Sasse officially announced his candidacy for the United States Senate seat occupied by Republican Mike Johanns, who is not running for re-election in 2014.

As of October 2013, Sasse's fundraising total of nearly $815,000 from individual donors in his first quarter broke Nebraska's previous record of $526,000 from individual donors, set in 2007 by Johanns while he was sitting U.S. Secretary of Agriculture.

In late 2013, Sasse incurred the enmity of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell through his association with the Senate Conservatives Fund, which opposed McConnell's bid for re-election in the Kentucky Republican primary, and for Sasse's declaration that McConnell had failed to provide "actual leadership". McConnell endorsed Shane Osborn, one of Sasse's primary opponents, and worked to fund Osborn's campaign and to dissuade potential contributors to Sasse's.

In December 2013, Sasse's candidacy was endorsed by House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan.

In January 2014, Sasse was featured on the cover of the prominent National Review magazine as a "rising conservative star."

Issues
In announcing his Senate candidacy, Sasse expressed strong opposition to the Affordable Care Act (ACA, a.k.a. "Obamacare"), describing himself as "the anti-Obamacare candidate", later declaring that "[i]f it lives, America as we know it will die."

Primary opponent Shane Osborn questioned the depth of Sasse's opposition to the ACA, pubicizing articles and speeches delivered by Sasse during and after the passage of the measure through Congress; according to the Omaha World-Herald, "Osborn's campaign appears intent on questioning whether Sasse is a true conservative." The Osborn campaign cited, among other pieces, a 2009 Bloomberg Businessweek column stating that "There's an emerging consensus that this [an individual mandate] might be a good idea", and a 2010 speech in which Sasse stated that Republicans would probably lack the votes to repeal the ACA, stating that "a middle class entitlement has never been repealed", and opining that Republicans had failed to offer a useful alternative to the ACA, preferring to stage "symbolic repeal votes". Sasse's response to the Osborn campaign's assertions was that in his articles and speeches, he was describing the political landscape rather than giving his own opinions on the merits of the ACA's provisions; to a World-Herald reporter, he declared "I have never changed my position on thinking Obamacare is a bad idea".

Sasse's campaign website indicates that he is pro-life, stating "even one abortion is too many". It suggests that he is opposed to same-sex marriage.

Sasse campaign materials state that "The Keystone Pipeline should have been built years ago."